Many Uses
by tielan
Summary: People can see things very differently. [John&Teyla]


**Many Uses**

When the light of the transporter faded around him, John found himself in the cargo bay of the Daedelus, facing Colonel Caldwell and the supply officer of the ship who were looking over a pallet of materials that, John presumed, were one of several destined for the city below.

"Sir."

"Sheppard."

John distrusted the smile about the senior officer's mouth. It had the smug tinge of a man who was looking forward to the next handful of minutes. "I hear you have a delivery for me?"

The two men stepped aside, showing the pallet. "Yes, sir, we do." It was the supply officer who spoke, and John shot him a wary glance. The man sounded entirely too chirpy for someone who'd just spent the last two weeks on a ship, waiting to offload his cargo. "A shipment for Teyla Emmagen, ordered under your ID and authorised by General O'Neill."

On the pallet, the pile of boxes seemed ordinary enough. "What's the problem?"

Caldwell cleared his throat. "No problem, Sheppard. Just a little curiosity."

"Included on the manifest are thirty standard military-issue tarps, forty yards of industrial strength rope, four bolts of woollen calico...and a box of Maybelline clear, fast-drying nail polish."

_Ah._ John remembered that requisition. He kept his expression calm and put his hands on his hips. "That seems about right," he said, refusing to betray any sign that this might be out of the ordinary.

"A whole box of nailpolish?"

John had asked that of Teyla, too. "It's useful."

"Useful in the same category as tarpaulin, rope, and calico?" Caldwell asked, his eyebrows somewhere halfway up his forehead.

"Apparently. Where do I sign?"

--

"Maybe it's a girly thing," Rodney suggested as they paced through the forest on their way to the Athosian camp. There were things to be done back in Atlantis, but John had decided that he could do with an hour's R&R and had absconded through the gate to New Athos, dragging Rodney with him.

"Rodney, even if every woman in the Athosian camp painted her nails, it wouldn't use more than a couple of bottles," said John, hopping over a low trench.

Rodney looked sideways at him. "How do you know that?"

"Because I've actually _had_ girlfriends?"

"Ha-ha."

They'd reached the edge of the Athosian camp, the 'meeting tent' with the communal pot of tuttleroot soup. Rodney immediately peered in, but John took him by the sleeve and directed him away to the sound of much protesting. "You're not hungry, you just had lunch."

"It smells so good. Obviously Teyla wasn't on the cooking roster today."

"I heard that, Rodney," Teyla stepped out of the tent, a loose wrap in earthy tones flung over her shoulders. A wry smile tinted her expression as she regarded her team-mates. "Were you not to be sorting through the newly-arrived supplies from Earth?"

"We're taking a break," John explained.

"He dragged me along," Rodney complained, rolling his eyes. "And we came to see what you're doing with the nail polish."

Ronon strode out from the tents. "The lacquer? That's useful stuff." He grinned at Rodney's sudden bug-eyed expression, and John's double-blink.

Teyla shot Ronon a quelling look as she turned back to their team-mates. "Perhaps you would like to see what is being done with the supplies?"

--

John watched as Teyla carefully applied the nail-polish along the edge of the rent in the thick Athosian tent-cloth. "And that keeps the water out?"

"It will always leak a little," she said, screwing the cap back on the tiny bottle. "That which is fixed is not always as good as that which is new. But it is sealed."

"Quick and convenient," Ronon murmured from the side as the smell of varnish began to permeate the tent.

Rodney wrinkled his nose. "Okay, I'm starting to feel light-headed in here. Can we have some air?"

Ronon exchanged a glance with Teyla, rolled his eyes, grabbed Rodney's shoulder and dragged the other man out of the tent. Rodney's protests punctuated by Ronon's teasing died into the distance as John pushed open a tent flap. A moment later, Teyla was there, tying it back to allow a solid cross-breeze through the space.

"So," she said, glancing across her arm at him as she pulled the knot closed, "are you satisfied with the use to which we are putting the resources you have brought us?"

He felt a little abashed. "Caldwell wanted to know what you were going to use it for. I think he must have imagined some kind of Pegasus beauty salon..."

Her smile broadened as she turned to look at him, brow arched. "Was that your imagining, also?"

John hedged. "Oh, I figured you had a use for it - I just...didn't know what the use was."

"You thought it as well."

He gave in. "It's nail polish, Teyla. What else is it going to be used for?"

"It is a lacquer that dries in only a few minutes, John," she pointed out. "It seals off frayed ends and smooths over the sharpest edges of pottery and metal tools. There are many uses for it."

"Maybe it's an Earth thing," he said, trying to shrug it off. "It's only used as nail polish on Earth..."

"Laura said she has used nailpolish to stop her stockings from laddering," Teyla pointed out. "And Dr. Houston uses it as a temporary binding glue on some of the components she works with. Even Elizabeth--"

"All right!" John interrupted the litany before she could go too much further. He'd vastly underestimated the purposes to which the nail polish could be used. "So, maybe it's a female thing."

"Maybe." She laughed at his embarrassment. "Or perhaps we are simply looking beyond what it was intended to be, to what other purposes for which it was made."

John rolled his eyes. "You probably don't have that much call for lacquered nails," he began. "Oh, fine," he complained when she held up her hands to reveal the shiny ovals of her nails. "Make a liar out of me."

Teyla laughed as she prompted him down the path back towards the main settlement. "You do a fine job of that without my help, John."

- **fin **-


End file.
